This section is intended to introduce the reader to various aspects of art that may be related to various aspects of the subject matter described and/or claimed below, and is believed to be helpful in providing background information to facilitate a better understanding of the present disclosure. It should be understood that these statements are to be read in this light, not as admissions of prior art.
The present disclosure relates generally to ferroelectric non-volatile memory cells and their use in the context of an electronic device and, more specifically, to generation of random numbers using ferroelectric non-volatile memory cells.
Electronic devices, such as consumer electronics, integrated circuits, embedded systems, microcontrollers, and the like, can often include one or more memory devices that store information, such as data and program instructions. To prevent unauthorized access to such information, such devices may include one or more security measures to protect information. This is particularly useful in cases where the protected information is of a sensitive nature, such as, for example, a patient's medical information stored on a medical device, a user's payment information stored on a “smart” credit card, or even a user's personal information (e.g., internet browsing history, GPS location, text messages) stored on a smartphone. Moreover, there has been a growing trend in recent years to incorporate network connectivity into electronic devices. For instance, some electronic devices that traditionally lacked such network connectivity, such as home appliances, televisions, and even automobiles, are now being manufactured with network connectivity functions. It is envisioned that this trend, sometimes called the “internet of things” (IoT), will continue and that network connectivity will continue to be incorporated into more and more electronic devices. However, network connectivity also presents an additional vector by which an unauthorized user may attempt to access protected information. Accordingly, the need for security measures in electronic devices for protection of information is now more important than ever.
Examples of types of security measures that can be implemented on such electronic devices include authentication measures, integrity monitoring, and encryption. Authentication generally requires that proper credentials, such as a password or key phrase, be supplied in order to access protected information. Integrity checking can be used to monitor for changes in software files to ensure that program software, such as an operating system or application software, has not been modified in an unauthorized manner. Encryption can be used to encode protected information on the device so that only authorized parties have access, usually through the use of one or more digital encryption keys. For example, such digital encryption keys may be based on a symmetric-key algorithm (e.g., Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) 128, 192, or 256 bits) or an asymmetric key algorithm (e.g., using a public/private key pair).
Random number generation is often used to implement the aforementioned security measures. For instance, random numbers can be used to generate passwords for authentication purposes and are often the basis of many encryption schemes. By way of example, random numbers can be used as a basis for generating digital keys, such as for data encryption or file integrity checking (e.g., generating a checksum value). Many current techniques for generating random numbers typically involve software routines and algorithms that generate a pseudo-random number based on an initial seed value. Numbers generated by such a process are pseudo-random because while they might satisfy one or more statistical tests for randomness, they are still determined in part by the initial seed value. It is generally desirable that a random number be as unpredictable as possible. Stated another way, if random numbers used for security purposes can be guessed with any accuracy, the security of any scheme relying on such random numbers is compromised. Accordingly, improved methods of generating random numbers are particularly useful, especially as the need for protecting digital information continues to grow.